Chad Valley Swing and Glide Multiplay.
Chad Valley Swing and Glide Multiplay Review.
I don't like spending a fortune on garden toys for my boy, he tends to show little interest until you start discussing selling them and then he wants to know! So I tend to try and buy less expensive garden toys or even second hand stuff found on Facebay, Ebay or Gumtree. We recently sold his Little Tykes 8 in 1 Playground, which he loved when he was little but unfortunately has now outgrown, so we decided to use the money on buying him a multi swing of some sort. Most of what I managed to find nearby that were second hand, was a bit rusty, so I carried out some research and found a few
competitively priced ones. I can't believe how expensive garden toys are, I am always looking for bargains, although am also happy to pay what things are worth, so we found three we liked and went for the best one which offered what we wanted and in the lowest price range.
I used click & collect from Argos, my husband collected it for me & then built it, so I only thought it be fair this opinion is mainly from his point of view. The conclusion is from us both!
Chad Valley Swing & Glide Multiplay
£63.99
Bought from Argos & actually came in a surprisingly small box and fitted easily in the car, although quite heavy to carry. We were really impressed on the price, however please see our thoughts at the end, because this comes with a couple of pros & cons!
The writing on the outside of the box states that it will take two people 30 minutes to put together, however I am doing it alone so we will see.
Well packaged with no damage to the box and once opened the part appear to be well labelled and undamaged.
The instructions are clear and straight forward so even I can understand them.
Especially impressive is the way they have packaged the nuts and bolts. The back of the packaging is perforated so you can access the parts without having to tip them out (especially useful in the garden!)
Getting started was held up briefly as two of the main components were labelled incorrectly, so it took a bit of working out.
Most of the parts push together and are held in place with bolts. Allen keys and a ring spanner are supplied to tighten these up, but he spanner is pretty rubbish so I used a socket set to save time.
Unfortunately some of the supplied bolts were too long for the location they were intended for, so when they were tightened sufficiently they split the plastic caps on the nuts, not the end of the world, but looks a bit scruffy.
I did have to replace one bolt which sheared off, but this may have been down to my heavy
handedness and probably wouldn't have happened if I had been using the weedy tools supplied.
On one occasion I had to take apart a the side rails as the pictures in the instructions were not clear enough, so I had to guess if they went inside or outside of the frame (I guessed wrong).
The Chad Valley Swing & Glide Multi play was supplied with a two seater, rowing type swing and two individual swings, we chose to replace one of the individual swings with a rope ladder to give a bit of variety, which my wife bought on Ebay for about £10. This fitted easily to one of the metal rings intended to for the swing and could be swapped over in 5 minutes if necessary.
Fitted to the side of the multiplay is a canvas sheet with two holes in it which seems a bit pointless and will probably be removed fairly soon. We are guessing that they are meant for football targets?!
Our Conclusion.
On the whole the Chad Valley Swing & Glide Multiplay is a nice swing set for our lad who is 5 years old. I am pretty sure it will last ok size wise for a few years to come. The structure is good and should survive life outside pretty well.
Our little boy is very pleased and should have a lot of fun with it, especially when his friends come round to play.
However do not expect to have this built in 30 minutes unless you have a Formula 1 pit crew at your disposal, it took me 2 hours and 25 minutes from start to finish, although I was working alone and on the hottest day of the year.
Please note, this was the hottest day of the year so far The heat did raise a concern to us, as the majority of parts are painted metal and the plastic seats are held on by exposed metal bolts. These became very hot in the sun, so we will have to be cautious when letting the children play on it on very hot days. My wife quite quickly suggested we consider taking it back, but now, two weeks later, we can tell on cooler days it isn't such a concern. Still, we would have thought outdoor children's toys that are made to hold onto and sit on, really shouldn't have metal on as a safety measure. If this isn't a law, then maybe it should become one because these bolts and metal get unbelievably hot, too hot for anyone to sit on, let alone a small child that cannot judge this properly.
Two weeks later and it is still a hot time of year, although just slightly cooler than the day the Multiplay was built and we have decided to keep the swing as the metal parts are not as bad anymore. Not dangerous as far as heat is concerned, our boy has played on it a lot and also with some friends, so all in all a nice addition to the garden at a very competitive price.